Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3438 in Books
• Published on: 2005-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 257 pages

Synopsis
How do directors use screen direction to suggest conflict? How do screenwriters exploit film space to show change? How does editing style determine emotional response? Many first-time writers and directors do not consider this. They forgo the huge creative resource of the film medium defaulting instead to dialog and narration to tell their screen story. Yet most movies are carried by sound and picture. What the industry's most successful writers and directors have in common is that they have mastered the cinematic conventions specific to the medium. They have harnessed non-dialog techniques to create some of the most cinematic moments in movie history. This book is intended to help writers and directors more fully exploit the medium's storytelling techniques. It contains 100 non-dialog techniques that have been used by the industry's top writers and directors. From "Metropolis" and "Citizen Kane" to "Dead Man" and "Kill Bill", the book illustrates - through 500 frame grabs and 75 script excerpts - how the inherent stortytelling devices specific to film were exploited. You can learn how non-dialogue film techniques can advance story.

You can discover how master screenwriters exploit cinematic conventions to create powerful scenarios. It is brilliantly illustrated throughout with 500 carefully chosen frame grabs from classic films of the past and present.

Customer Reviews

A very clear and helpful book
There is a huge amount of information in this book. It is very clearly and logically laid out with sections on, for example, space, framing, editing, locations, wardrobe, music, camera movement, editing, transitions. The key point is how all these elements can be used to support the story, and guide emotional responses.
I had already made two short films when I discovered this book, and it was a revelation to understand the logic behind many of the things I had done intuitively. It has also broadened my awareness of many other elements to consider in the cinematic storytelling process.
One of the great aspects of this comprehensive book is that it can be dipped into at will. There are a hundred different conventions, all illustrated with examples from real films, and often with the screenplay printed alongside. Every time I pick it up I learn something new. I recommend it to all directors who believe that a great story, cinematically told, is the end goal of all our filmmaking efforts.

Good written, bad images.
The written content of the book itself is very useful, however, the quality of the stills taken from the films they are describing is terrible.
This is a book about film and yet all of the reference pictures are black and white (even when they are talking about colour) hard to see, bad quality.

The book should be reprinted with better quality photos. No doubt about it.

interesting information
I just finished the book, it has a lot of interesting information that I haven't seen in other books. it can get a bit boring at a time as it seems to reuse some movies a bit too much..
I have to agree with one of the other readers that the images could have been a bit better..
I had one problem with the book.. It misses the last 4 pages for some reason (it is a brand new copy), maybe even more, but item 99 and 100 are missing from my copy of the book..